چکیده انگلیسی

Following Fukuyama's (2001) postulation for future research in economic development, this paper examines the cultural hypothesis regarding national economic prosperity. Culture is found to affect economic performance through two channels; cultural traits that stimulate individual motivation, and traits that develop social capital in the population. Culture is defined as a society's beliefs and value system and operationalized through the use of variables from the World Values Survey (WVS). The analysis controls for factors commonly recognized in the economic growth literature. The results are sustained through a sensitivity analysis using a variant of extreme bounds analysis (EBA). Compared with previous empirical studies, this research deepens the cultural analysis, increases the number of observations, and lengthens the time period studied.

مقدمه انگلیسی

“The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is the material forces of production and not the consciousness of men that determines their existence.” Karl Marx On Political Economy (1859).
We are cultural beings, endowed with the capacity and the will to take a deliberate attitude toward the world and to lend it significance. Max Weber Objectivity in Social Science and Social Policy (1904)
“Lawgivers make the citizen good by inculcating habits in them, and this is the aim of every lawgiver; if he does not succeed in doing that, his legislation is a failure. It is in this that a good constitution differs from a bad one.” Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics (350 BC)
In 20th century social sciences, factor allocation, geographic location, historical coincidence, human capital, political systems and economic policies were among the factors advanced as the main causes for national differences in economic prosperity. However, in a summary of the literature on economic development, Fukuyama (2001) called for the development of a method that incorporates cultural factors into modern theoretical and empirical models already in use by economists. This research represents such an attempt. The paper contains six sections. It starts with a short introduction, followed by a review of the literature of cultural influence on the economy, theory and methods, results, discussion and a conclusion.
Classical economists like Adam Smith and institutional economists like Torstein Veblen regarded culture as instrumental in shaping economic outcomes. However, beginning in the late 19th century, cultural research became mostly a domain of sociologists, anthropologists and organization studies as cultural explanations lost esteem in favor of more mechanical approaches in economics. From the 1950s onward sociology and anthropology followed suit. A rejection of any explanation of economic outcomes that invokes a group's cultural attributes, its distinct attitudes, values and predispositions, and the resulting behavior of its members” became the rule in all social sciences according to Patterson (2006: 13). Many economists adopted a Marxist understanding of the causational direction between economics and culture, where the economy is not embedded in the social system, but governs it (Polanyi, 1944). Culture and economic prosperity was therefore rarely linked with economic development. The main exception being the subfields of business administration, like strategy, management, and organization theory where the idea of cultural importance to economic performance become commonly accepted in the late 20th century according to Papamarcos and Watson (2006).
Given that casual observations indicate their importance it is peculiar that 20th century economics not more readily investigated the role of cultural factors. The Italian economy is a good example. While Northern and Southern Italy have had the same formal institutional structures, and have been ruled by the same central governments over the last 150 years, Northern Italy has a GDP per capita that is 25 percent higher than the EU average, while Southern Italy's GDP is 25 percent lower than the EU average. The lower productivity in the South is also evident through the Italian judicial system. Despite the same incentive structure, it takes much longer to complete investigations and rule on civil cases in Southern Italy (Tabellini, 2008: 1). Belgium offers a similar pattern to Italy; the Flemish Protestant areas in the North have traditionally been more productive than the French and Catholic Valonia in the South. India, which inherited its formal institutions and technology from the UK, still has persistently lower productivity levels than the UK sixty years later. Likewise, Argentina and Australia, two countries with comparable climate, colonial history and natural resources has experienced very different paths of economic prosperity over the last century.
However, there also exist geographical differences in prosperity that cannot be explained by culture. North Korea had a similar cultural foundation to South Korea 60 years ago, but their current differences in economic prosperity can better be explained by the quality of formal institutional structures and economic policies.
The substantial constraining element beliefs and values may impose on instrumental rationality can be illustrated through a comparison of traditional African culture with the culture of the early United States. Family and tribe play a substantially more prominent role than the individual and the government in African countries; this causes norms, traditions and conventions to play an even more important part than in developed economies.
A distinct characteristic in traditional African culture is the low level of savings in the economy; surplus income is often consumed immediately.1Dia (1991: 5) described the lack of frugality: “there is a social and mystical need for what westerners may call wastefulness. For example, among the Diola of Senegal, L.V. Thomas observed the massacre of 750 head of cattle to celebrate a circumcision ceremony, and it is not uncommon for poor, malnourished farmers to give away vast quantities of foods on the occasion of marriages, circumcisions, or burials.” Excess income, according to Dia's research, only serves to extend or widen the circle of beneficiaries.
Economic success achieved outside of the group often leads to ostracism. Economic progress is therefore not related to upward social mobility like it is in the Western World. Dia (1991: 4) again explains the particular African experience very well:
African economic psychology is generally characterized by powerful connections between objects, humans and the supernatural. Although the emphasis put on each of these elements, and the interrelationships among them, can vary from one ethnic group or tribe to another, the quest for equilibrium with other human beings and with the supernatural is generally the dominant guiding principle. The frontiers separating collective preferences from individual ones are often non-existent or quite vague. Typically, a higher value is placed on interpersonal relations and the timely execution of certain social and religious or mystic activities than on individual achievements. The circumstances, and sometimes the ritual surrounding the economic transactions, are often more important than the principles governing these transactions. The value of economic acts is measured in terms of their capacity to reinforce the bonds of the group.
These African cultural traits that Dia reported, have been supported by the work of French scholar Binet (1970) on economic psychology in fifty-six African tribes.2
Differences between the African tribal culture and the Protestant ethic are distinctly embodied by Franklin (1748) almost 300 years ago
Remember, that time is money. He that can earn ten shillings a day by his labor, and goes abroad, or sits idle, one half of that day, though he spends but sixpence during his diversion or idleness, ought not to reckon that the only expense; he has really spent, or rather thrown away, five shillings besides. … Remember, that money is the prolific, generating nature. Money can beget money, and its offspring can beget more, and so on. Five shillings turned is six, turned again is seven and three pence, and so on, till it becomes a hundred pounds. The more there is of it, the more it produces every turning, so that the profits rise quicker and quicker. He that kills a breeding sow, destroys all her offspring to the thousandth generation. He that murders a crown, destroys all that it might have produced, even scores of pounds.
The field of Psychology, exemplified in Maslow's Motivation and Personality (1954: 66), has provided evidence that motivation is important to human action. The cultural traits discussed above must therefore play an important role in the economy as well as social life.

نتیجه گیری انگلیسی

The full model displayed in Table 2 explains approximately 72 percent of the variance in economic growth in the sample of 57 low and middle-income countries between 1969 and 2008. Robust standard error is used to control for heteroskedasticity. There is no indication of an omitted variable bias based on the Ramsey test. There is no collinearity of the factor-regressors and only low collinearity between the control-regressors. The F-test and Bartlett's test indicates that the findings are reliable. The other standard post-regression estimates also appear solid.The point estimates for all the hypotheses are in the predicted direction and sub-hypotheses 1a, 1b, as well as 2 and 3a, are all statistically significant.
The point estimate for entrepreneurial value suggests that a unit increase in entrepreneurial value will lead, on average, to a .39 percent increase in annual economic growth. Theoretically then, if a country goes from a state of no children being thought entrepreneurial values to a state of all children being thought these values economic growth would increase about 4 percent a year. The standardized coefficient reveals that Entrepreneurial values in the population is as important as the quality of the legal structure and property rights to economic growth. Furthermore, using the magnitude of the standardized coefficients, Entrepreneurial values are 1.5 times as effective in increasing average economic growth when compared to increasing formal education in the population. Thrift indicates that increasing saving by one unit will lead, on average, to a .37 percent increase in annual economic growth. Hypothesis 2, testing the concept of Weber's Spirit of Capitalism indicates a statistically positive effect on annual economic growth. The point estimate of this factor is difficult to interpret as the factor contains variables with different measurement level, however, the standardized coefficient suggest that this factor is more important than the level of formal education to economic growth. Combined, these results suggest that individual motivation in the form of an achievement orientation plays a very significant role in the economic performance of a country and is a more important factor than the combined influence of the quality of formal institutions and the quantity of formal education. Hypothesis 3a, Honesty, shows a statistically positive effect. The point estimate suggests that for a one unit increase in Honesty, average economic growth increases 1.9 percent. The standardized coefficient suggests that the level of Honesty is as important as formal education to economic growth. Hypothesis 3b has the right sign, but is not significant, thereby failing to support Hypothesis 3b. Hypothesis 3c, Unselfishness, also failed significance at the conventional level. Using the method of Partial R2, individual motivation has about a 58% percent importance compared to 42% for community oriented values on the level of economic growth. The control variable of Ex-communist, Initial GDP, Education level and Legal Structure/Property Rights are found to have a statistical effect on average economic growth. These control findings indicate that a former communist country has on average 2.3 percent per year lower growth rates than a country that has not been communist considering the period as a whole. This difference can explain some of the disparity in GDP between Eastern Europe and Western Europe during the time period studied. Although a larger size of government seem to limit average economic growth, the findings are not significant. Ceteris paribus a higher level of free-trade policies does not statistically effect economic growth during this time period.
The sensitivity test using Leamer's extreme bounds analysis returns significant values at the .1 p-value for Entrepreneurial values, Honesty and Weber's spirit of capitalism, but not at the .05 level. This sensitivity test may be too strict considering the sample size and the natural interplay of many variables in explaining a complex issue like economic growth, but the results still helps to provide evidence for the major findings.